Borgata banks on coinless slots

John Curran

Monday, July 7, 2003 | 9:33 a.m.

ATLANTIC CITY -- It's so quiet, it's eerie.

That's one of the first things gamblers are noticing about the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa, the first casino in Atlantic City to use all coinless slot machines.

All 3,650 machines have what is called ticket-in, ticket-out technology, meaning that they take cash but dispense winning wagers and credits in voucher tickets. The tickets are redeemable for cash or can be used to transfer credits to other machines.

"I don't like that they don't pay off in coins," said Bernadette Francesco, 38, of Philadelphia, who was playing Thursday. "There's no money in your hands, there's no dinging sound. It's too quiet."

The coinless machines, which were introduced in Las Vegas three years ago and Atlantic City last fall, threaten to make obsolete the coin cups that gamblers have been toting around this city for 25 years.

The other big benefit is that they eliminate the need to handle coins.

It's no small concern: Last year, slot machines won $3.3 billion from Atlantic City gamblers, or about 74 percent of casinos' total revenue.

Strictly speaking, the machines aren't completely coinless. Inside, they contain a cache of tokens that are used to pay off jackpots in the event that the ticket-printers don't work.

Borgata, which opened its doors Wednesday, is the first to use nothing but coinless machines. In keeping with its Italian village theme, Borgata's machines bear names such as Palio Pix and Carneval, as well as Aces and Faces.

"The trend, in the past few -- in Las Vegas and Atlantic City -- is that customers like not having to deal with dirty coins and carry the cups around," said Paul Tjoumakaris, vice president of slot operations at Borgata.

Boyd Gaming Corp. President Donald Snyder said his company thought long and hard about whether to use the machines exclusively at Borgata, in part for fears that older gamblers would resist the technology aspect.

"All of us thought that initially, but the acceptance of these machines has been universal," he said.

Well, not quite.

Among the converts Thursday was Russ Wells, 49, of Marlton, who won $500 on one of the machines.

"I like the vouchers, they're easier," he said.

Crowds mobbed the new casino Thursday, illustrating the logic behind Borgata officials' refusal to give an opening time for the casino a day earlier.

The start of gambling came just before midnight Wednesday, but there were no crowds rushing in the doors. People filtered in, then waited for dealers to open up the blackjack tables, roulette wheels and craps tables.

"What we did not want to do was announce an opening time that would cause people to queue up a long time in advance, causing the inconvenience," Borgata CEO Robert Boughner said.

But there was plenty of inconvenience Thursday, as eager gamblers -- having seen media coverage of the previous night's opening or full-page "Ready, Set, Borgata" advertisements in New York and Philadelphia newspapers -- flooded the casino.

Some delays were due to system failures, others to employees still learning how to operate computers, others to sheer volume.

Lines of cars backed up on the ramps leading from the Atlantic City Expressway Connector to the Borgata site, inching forward toward the parking garage.

Checking out, for some people, took more than 35 minutes.

At the valet parking cashier, a glitch in a computer system caused some people to wait more than an hour to retrieve their vehicles. Among them was Ellen Nardiello, 62, of Toms River.

"I've never seen it this bad in any casino, and I've been to three openings," Nardiello said. "We'll come back, but not for three weeks or so."